In tonight’s episode of Project Runway: Under the Gunn, the remaining contestants head to Meltdown Comics to meet with Marvel Animation head Cort Lane, who introduces them to various currently popular Marvel characters. Hawkeye and Captain Marvel top the list in this promo video, and then it’s not a shock that Gamora and Falcon are also namechecked, as this is all to promote upcoming Marvel movies, of course. (If you don’t watch Project Runway and its spinoffs, you should note they’ve become increasingly whorey over the years. Take that, Tim Gunn. Fishnets are for the cool kids.)

Under the Gunn is a new Project Runway spinoff, hopefully more entertaining than Project Accessory, which was a hot mess. In this series, three Project Runway vets are saddled with a bunch of newbies in order to create a mini-fashion-empire. (Also, to win cash prizes.) I haven’t been watching because my DVR hates me. But I spy PR Vet Mondo in this preview, so at least I know he’s made it through most of the season and hasn’t been chased off by some contestant who has gone crazy over jorts. (Yeah, so that happened once.)

The designers have been tasked with creating a look “inspired” by a Marvel character, but have been warned not to make a costume. I predict Anya’s team gives us some sort of wrap dress in some hideous print because that’s what she’s all about. But it’ll have blue and red, because Captain Marvel was an alcoholic once and that speaks to her.

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Not sure if this is a spoiler or not, but this week’s guest judge will be Jaimie Alexander. It’s the last episode before the finale, so I guess this is a terrible time to start watching it. However, it airs on Lifetime at 8pm EST.

I love Tim Gunn but haven’t managed to drum up any interest in this show; it may be that the prior season of “Project Runway” was just so indescribably terrible in challenges (the Yoplait/Coney Island Challenge, the “Glamping” episode) and designers (Unicorn Boy, the Raging Russian, Lilliputian Ken, etc.) that I’ve been put off the brand for a while. I might try to tune in tonight, or just check here for a recap tomorrow.

The only problem I had with last Season of Project Runway was the way Tim Gunn was totally worn out by those people. The post-season episode where he talks about how for once he hated coming in to work was very telling. I imagine that might be why this show came about–so other people can mentor for a while.

It was exhausting merely as a viewer to deal with those designers week after week. I can’t imagine having to walk into the workroom and be surrounded by their histrionics for hours at a time. Half of them were either mentally unstable or in completely over their skill level (and a few of them were both).

It’s my understanding that “Under the Gunn” came about because Heidi had a scheduling conflict for filming the next season of PR and she and Tim have a pinkie promise to never do the show without each other. I would have liked to have seen another pick-up for “Tim Gunn’s Guide to Style,” which was a less hyper “What Not to Wear” (that certainly could fill the now-departed WNTW’s void). There’s no shortage of women who need to be told that elastoband pants and flip-flops in public are always a no-no.

Bunim-Murray taking over producing is when it really started to slide down the reality show trash path. You can see the blatant producer interference in the hour and half format. When they re-air past 90 minute episodes they edit it down to a regular hour format and it’s just like the old show — there’s no time for hysterics and jorts-throwing because they actually focus on making clothes. Tim Gunn’s lack of input and guidance in the last season was pretty telling, too. He had nothing helpful to say to the designers; in retrospect he was probably afraid of getting shanked.